Even Angels Fall
by xPockyNoMikox
Summary: The way the musical should have ended... When Christine returns to Erik in the last scene, she gives him not the ring, but the rest of her life...


Standard Disclaimers Apply!

a/n: Though I'm not new to writing fanfiction, this is my first POTO fic, so CC is welcome!  
Very quickly... Any italicized words inside a set of -x- means song lyrics.

Even Angels Fall

"Make your choice!"

x-  
_You've found hope  
You've found faith,  
Found how fast she could take it away.  
_-x-

Maskless, I stand between them, clinging to my battered pride and the tattered remains of hope like a shield, another mask to hide behind. Stripped down to the core, my naked face a burning with humiliation, I force back the tears and gather the darkness around me. Comforting in its familiarity, it lends me strength, and I straighten my shoulders. I'd already lost my future to her; I would not cede my last thread of pride.

I knew she could never love me, not after everything I'd done. _She never could,_ some part of me whispers, a part I pretend to ignore but that continues its desolate mantra in my head. _You're a monster,_ it says. _She looked past your face, but what she found was even uglier. You're a monster. You're a monster . . . _

I know it's right.

I had begun to trust Christine - real trust, not that blind obsession her voice had kindled in me - and I like to imagine that she had trusted me. That was my first mistake. Even after all the years of countless rejections and terror-filled eyes, I had willingly begun to disassemble the walls I'd built around myself. Brick by brick I sealed my fate, and now here I stand, trembling with fear and rage and despair, to face my doom.

How quickly my illusions were shattered.

_"What tears I might have shed for your dark fate grow cold . . . and turn to tears of hate."_

With those trembling, whispered words, she took everything away. It is my fault, I know. But that only makes the pain worse.

Christine steps forward, slowly, her eyes sparkling with the wavering light of unshed tears. She stops a few paces from me, her eyes never leaving mine, and reaches a hand out to me. "Pitiful creature of darkness, what kind of life have you known? God give me courage to show you . . . You are not alone."

x-  
_Found true love,  
Lost your heart.  
Now you don't know who you are.  
_-x-

Her hands climb through the heavy darkness to brush against my cheeks, soft and deathly cold against my face. She doesn't shudder or flinch away as she brushes the roughened skin, but draws me down until we are only inches apart, close enough for our breaths to mingle as she smiles through her tears. And then her eyes fall closed, and her lips claim mine.

The burning ice that had encased my heart melts away, and all the emotions I'd shoved away come crashing back. Tears flood from my eyes to mix with hers, and though her eyes remain closed, I know she can sense them, taste them, for she pulls me closer, tender and sweet, and presses her small hand against my heart.

Time seems to slow around us while the world spins wildly; Christine and I are the only players in this world of love and tears, this world of illusion and light, and I can almost imagine that her tears are ones of love, not pity . . . that I am the man of her dreams, not the monster of her nightmares. That this kiss, the only thing I'd ever asked for in life, could last forever . . .

But the illusion is shattered all too soon, and I plummet back into reality with sickening speed, tumbling back into my realm of darkness with a cold shudder. It is then that I realize that Christine has withdrawn, taking all my dreams with her. I stand before her cold, numb, save for a terrible ache in my heart . . .

A voice breaks through the silence, telling them to forget everything, to take the boat, to leave . . .

It is my voice.

I fight against it, rage against it, but I cannot stop the words from tumbling from my lips like tears, and I watch in horror as my hand releases the boy. My fingers curl into fists as I watch him run to Christine, my Christine, but I cannot move. My body is no longer my own; only my eyes are still under my control, and I blink away the tears to watch Raoul sweep Christine in his arms and kiss her.

The last tendril of hope left in my heart shatters, and each sliver cuts like glass as it falls. I wait for Death - surely this pain is fatal - but she never comes. My heart still beats, my blood still flows, my chest still rises and falls. I am breathing the same air as Christine; her scent drifts around me, keeping me alive, blocking out the putrid smell of a broken heart. As long as she is near, I will continue to live; but I would rather die than hurt her, and so I watch in silence as she stands locked in the boy's arms, crying softly against his chest.

"Go now," I whisper. "Go now and leave me!"

x-  
_She made it easy,  
Made it free,  
Made you hurt 'til you couldn't see.  
_-x-

_Christine . . . _

I realize now that I was blind. I had been blinded by her beauty, both physical and spiritual. Christine was all that I was not; she was a rose to my weed, an angel to my demon, Juliet to my freakish Frankenstein creature. I had almost imagined that her beauty was such that it could eclipse my face and allow her to see my heart. Instead, it was I who was blinded, a mistake that proved fatal in the hands of Raoul de Chagny.

I couldn't see that fear chained Christine to me, not love. Fear for the boy, for her life, for her sanity. There was no denying the power of my voice; one song was all I needed to completely break her will and mold it to my purposes. Even if she does love me, who is to say it is true, and not some spell cast over her by my voice? Even my greatest gift is often a curse . . .

Yet when she sang, when our voice melded and danced through the notes of song . . . In Christine's voice I could forget the past and dream of a future worth living for . . . a future bright enough to hide the shadows on my soul. Christine never asked anything of me, never demanded anything I wasn't willing to give. She made it so easy to believe . . .

The radiance of her soul, her voice, her smile was so bright that I couldn't see the shadow of fear that hid behind it, the way the mask hid my face.

But now the mask is gone, and I can see again.

x-  
_Sometimes it stops,  
Sometimes it flows,  
But baby that is how love goes.  
_-x-

The sound of ripples grows fainter as the boat moves farther away, gliding toward the opposite shore of the lake, the shore I know I will never see again.Christine is gone - what is there for me to live for? My future was with Christine, _was _Christine, and she was no longer mine. I had let her go, given her to Raoul de Chagny rather than see her wither in the darkness of my world. The decision had been mine, true, but had it not been for that damned boy, it would never have had to been made.

Raoul might as well have stabbed me himself; the result was the same.

Their voices echo off the walls enclosing the lake, haunting me as I once haunted her. I strain to catch her voice, just to hear it one last time, but Raoul's deeper tenor drowns it out.I feel a brief rush of anger at him, but it doesn't last, and once it's gone I feel ever weaker than before. My energy is gone, as is my will to live . . .

Another sound drifts through the flickering darkness, this one softer, less urgent, almost mocking. The music box begins to play as if by magic, its liltingtune wrapping around me in a cold, unfeeling cloak of song. A memory slowly surfaces, an image of black and white masks dancing down a grand staircase . . .

I close my eyes against the tears and give myself to the music, my sole comfort left, though I'm not unaware of the irony. Fitting, that the final song of my life is this. A bitter smile creeps onto my face as I dredge up the energy to sing.

"Masquerade . . . Paper faces on parade. Hide your face so the world will never find you . . . "

x-  
_You will fly and you will crawl;  
God knows even angels fall.  
No such thing as you lost it all.  
God knows even angels fall.  
_-x-

I'd built myself a crypt, a glorious, extravagant mausoleum called the Opera Populaire. Though I hadn't known it at the time, the Opera was a gilded cage, my underground home a prison from which Iwould never escape. This is my kingdom. Like Hades, I am condemned to rule the underworld, never to soar through the sunlight on the heights of love . . .

Christine could never return here. No . . . If I am Hades, then she is Persephone, goddess of spring, who is drawn to the light like a moth to fire. Persephone, who is bound back into the sunlight with her hero, though unlike Hades I couldn't claim her for the darker months of winter. The delicate petals of a rose were not as binding as pomegranate seeds . . .

If I am an Angel, my wings are torn and blackened, my halo extinguished, my soul as dark as the devil's. I have nothing to offer save my voice, and even that cannot compare with the world of sunrises and summers that Raoul can give. I can never compare . . . I am a monster, my fingers stained red with countless murders, my soul burdened with a life of deceit and hatred.

And yet, wasn't Lucifer an angel before he fell?

Suddenly the walls beginto close in on me, suffocating me, drowning me in the blackness in which I had once taken shelter. I don't resist; I haven't the strength, and besides,what have I to live for?Christine is gone, and at least in hell there is some light.

x-  
_It's a secret no one tells;  
One day it's heaven,  
one day it's hell.  
_-x-

The sound of the music box slowly fades, and my the haze of despair recedes from my mind.Its grip on my heart doesn't lessen, however, and I feel the tears begin anew. Even Death refuses me . . .

The last notes of the music box echo into the distance, but it is not silence that takes their place. The soft rippling of water drifts toward me, growing louder, until it ripples to a stop behind me. I imagine Raoul come back to kill me, to free Christine of my spell forever . . . Or perhaps it is Charon, come to take me to hell. _I'm already there, my friend_ . . .

I turn to great my fate to see Christine making her waytoward me, her white gown pooling around her, her brown eyes large with emotion. It's not Death who's come, but an angel . . . She kneels beside me in the water and extends her hand.

Her small fingers slowly uncurl,revealing the glittering engagement ring that had been my mother's.

I shake my head, silently begging her not to do this. I didn't want it back. Sell it, melt it, toss it in the lake, but don't give it back, don't complete my misery with this final act of rejection. I'd given her my heart with that ring, and now it was dead, and I didn't want it back._ Return it and the gate sealing my fate will close forever . . . You hold the key, Christine . . . Please, don't do this._

She reaches out for my hand, and, as always, I am unable to resist her.Her warm skin touches mine, gentle, almost tender, as her fingertips brush my palm. But instead of placing the ring in it, she covers it with her own, her small fingers guiding mine, and slips the ring on her own finger.

x-  
_It's no fairy tale;  
Take it from me,  
That's the way it's supposed to be.  
_-x-

I stare at her hand in disbelief, unsure - unwilling to believe - what it means. I thought my heart had died, but that wicked angel of hope manages to revive it, and it beats painfully as I trace the lines of the ring around her finger. It's the perfect size; she and my mother were nearly identical. Identical in appearance, yet so different in spirit. . .

Christine's voice breaks through my thoughts, drawing my gaze up to her eyes. She reaches out to cup my cheek with her hand and smiles, tears glistening in her eyes. "I cannot deny my heart any longer," she whispers. "I love you, Erik."

I stare at her in disbelief, my breath caught on the knot of hope and fear swelling in my chest. Her words echo through my mind, unreal, empty, yet heavy with emotion. Could this be real? Or was I lost in some dream, some feverish delusion born of a broken heart? "Christine," I murmur. "Christine . . . "

She leans closer, and a single tear makes its way down my cheek as I sit paralyzed before her. She smiles as she brushes it away. "This is the way it's supposed to be.I love you, Erik. Let me be your angel now . . . Let us live happily ever after. You deserve that much, at least."

"But," I murmur, riding the wave of hope inside me, trembling on its crest. "What about the boy?"

Christine shakes her head, the gray mist of sadness clouding her eyes for a moment. "I love him dearly, like a brother. I will miss him. But I love you . . . like a wife."

x-  
_You will fly and you will crawl;God knows even angels fall.  
No such thing as you lost it all.  
God knows even angels fall.  
_-x-

I shake my head again, this time in wonder, and shudder under the weight of the gift she is offering me. "I'm no angel," I whisper, searching her wide eyes in wary hopefulness. I still couldn't believe. "I'm a monster."

"You are an angel," she replies softly, smiling. "You're my angel."

"An angel of darkness!" I cry.

"But an angel nonetheless," she says. She stops my protests with a finger to my lips and shifts closer, so close that we are almost touching. I can feel her breath on my face, can taste it as I breathe it in my own lungs. It's sweet, even sweeter than her voice as she whispers, "And God knows that even angels fall sometimes."

I moan, closing my eyes against the torrent of tears that flood them, tears of joy, of love. The wave of emotion crests within me, shuddering through my veins like fire, and I tremble at its power. "Oh, Christine . . . "

"Hush," she murmurs, tracing the line of my lips with her finger. Her hand moves until she is cupping my cheek, the cold metal of the band on her finger cool against my tear-burned skin. Tears that she kisses away, her lips trembling as they brush the roughened skin of my face. Suddenly I was cold, so cold, and yet so happy . . .

x-  
_You laugh,  
_-x-

Christine has come back.

The sheer ecstasy of that realization sings through me, and I laugh, a true laugh, deep and rich, as I collapse in her arms. Her voice joins mine, bubbling with the same joy coursing through me, and her lips brush mine . . .

x-  
_you cry,  
_-x-

More tears pour down my cheeks, but they're no longer shards of glass that rend and tear as they fall. They glisten briefly in the candlelight before disappearing into the waterof the lake, which eddies around us before carrying them away . . .

x-  
_no one knows why  
_-x-

I lean back to meet her gaze and smile, still lost in the heady mixture of love and joy swirling through my thoughts. Suddenly I cannot see how I doubted her love; it shone bright as a star in her eyes for all to see, unshadowed and pure. Christine is my angel, the one light I know will never fade . . .

x-  
_Behold the thrill of it all . . .  
_-x-

Christine rises and draws me up with her, her sodden gown clinging tightly to her body. I follow her out of the water, my hand still held fast in hers. She reaches with her other hand to where my mask lay beside her veil, and a small tremor runs down my spine. She picks up the veil, her fingers lightly brushing the mask, and gives me a small smile as she puts it on.

"This is my choice," she murmurs. "This is the point of no return."

x-  
_You're on the ride  
You might as well  
Open your eyes  
_-x-

Our lips meet again, melding, tasting, sensing, and I breathe a sigh of contentment. I loved Christine more than anything in the world; she was my dream, and my reality. My world was no longer dark. My dreams had been realized, and my future was bright.

x-  
_You will fly and you will crawl;  
God knows even angels fall.  
No such thing as you lost it all.  
God knows even angels fall.  
Even angels fall . . .  
_-x-

a/n: For those who don't knwo the myth about Hades and Persephone, Hades is the Greek god of the underworld who fell in love with Persephone, goddess of spring, and kidnapped her from a field of flowers. Zeus made him return her to the upper world, but she had eaten the food of the dead - six pomegranate seeds - and so she had to return to Hades for six months of the year.

Thank you all for reading and reviewing!


End file.
